


I am(bic)

by primeideal



Category: Babel-17 - Samuel R. Delany
Genre: F/M, Sonnets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-09
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:28:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24625504
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/primeideal/pseuds/primeideal
Summary: The Butcher can create as well as destroy.
Relationships: Nyles Ver Dorco/Rydra Wong
Comments: 3
Kudos: 7
Collections: Unconventional Fanwork Exchange 2020





	I am(bic)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Gammarad](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gammarad/gifts).



The story says Earth's god feared human power  
To speak as one, to build and touch the sky,  
And so confused their tongues, cast down their tower:  
That seeking to reach heavenward is why  
So many ways to speak and reason grew.  
You laughed, delighted at the ancient fable,  
For there was such a voice to laugh as _you_ ,  
Who cherished the diversity of Babel.

But this body and mind had been erased  
Until the day they barely understood  
The things these hands had done, how they'd disgraced  
This voice. How could these eyes perceive the good  
When any conversation was unknown,  
When every word appeared to stand alone?

* * *

Even light travels at a finite speed,  
To cross five galaxies--no easy task.  
But instantly, each planet turns to read  
The words that answer truth before they ask.  
It was your gift, your meter and your rhyme,  
That penetrated nebulae of war.  
And you return to speak in finite time  
Even though you are capable of more--

You also can see common words as slow  
And yet you do not think yourself too grand  
To use them. You would let each planet know  
The love you've seen, that they might understand  
In their own time how warfare's tools became  
Another way to speak and feel and name.

* * *

No lover, touching flesh and lips and skin,  
Who, like verb forms, delights to conjugate,  
Has ever been connected deep within  
As you and I happened to penetrate.  
No others had future and past laid bare,  
Felt their mind shunted back where it belongs,  
And, having come to themselves, still could share  
Words yet more fluent than all earthly songs.

But even had we not been fully bound,  
Entangled particles, although far-flung,  
There was a deeper reason I had found  
For praising you in every halting tongue.  
You taught me that to listen is to be.  
Before you gave me _you_ , you gave me _me_.


End file.
